A still from documentary The Verse of Us Photo: Courtesy of Yan Aijing

"A screw fell on the floor / just like before / in the same evening/ a man fell on the floor," late poet Xu Lizhi's poem is recited as scenes from manufactory lines are shown in the background. Choosing to end his life last year, the now eternally 24-year-old assembly worker for Foxconn has shocked the people of China with his penetrating verses about life.

Xu is one of six worker poets who are the focus of the recently released documentary The Verse of Us. All frontline laborers and mostly migrant workers from the countryside, these workers live at the bottom rung of society where they must deal with extremely dangerous and even inhuman working environments. When they pick up the pen, their verses are forceful, straightforward, and possess a primitive power to touch people's deepest feelings.

"They have taken so much of life's bitterness that they turn to poetry as an outlet to express their depression," Qin Xiaoyu, co-director for The Verse of Us, shared with the Global Times.

"Considering their role in industrialized society, their poems constitute a social epic that capture today's changing times."

A poetic plight

While poetry may seem a bit old fashioned, but it's most likely this untimeliness that caused Qin to see the value in these worker poets' persistence.
In his poetry, Jike Ayou, a young ethnic Yi man who works as a temp worker, expresses his feelings of being lost in the big city and shares his worry about the extinction of the ethnic culture of his hometown in Sichuan Province.

"For years, I drifted further than a feather," he writes. During the years he worked in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province, the room where he filled down coats with duck feathers was the same place he wrote his poems.

Chen Nianxi, a senior mining explosives expert with 15 years of experience walks a thin line between life and death every time he goes to work. Burdened with ailing parents and a son studying at middle school, he once compared his life to "three tons of explosive." Living far from home, Chen found comfort in writing after work, sometimes even writing in the instruction manuals for explosives. 

The spiritual comfort that poetry brought also goes for Wu Xia, a garment worker who has worked in factories since age 14; Old Well, a miner who has grown used to working 800 meters underground for the past 30 years; Black Bird, a former forklift driver who lost his job; and of course Xu, who spent his prime years working and writing at Foxconn.

Their forceful verses and sweat and blood shed as frontline workers interweave with each other, creating fantastic contrasting images that can be seen in the documentary. With the very hands they use to mine coal, produce clothing and blast rocks apart, they also manage to create verses that are darkly melancholy but not without hope. They represent their attitude towards life and death and reflect on the complicated world of workers that people would not otherwise know. 

An ugly wound

The six poets in the documentary were selected from Qin's book of the same name: a collection of worker poetry that was published earlier this year. A poet and critic, Qin started to pay special attention the poetry of workers in 2012. Acting as a judge for a poetry award that year, he discovered there were a large number of these types of poets in China.

"In the history of Chinese poetry, any new kind of poetry has the chance to develop and breath new life into the medium. Maybe even generate a new genre," Qin told the Global Times.

"But the literary value of worker poetry is usually ignored. I hope to demonstrate its strength with the book and film."

Besides its unique literary value, Qin also pointed out the value of these verses from a social standpoint. While everybody talks about telling China's story, Qin points out that "the story of these workers is indispensable if you want to tell the complete story of China's transition."

"Although their writing is only about their own lives, they provide evidence of what life is like at the bottom of society with their writing, and thereby reveal a more accurate picture of society," Qin added.

It's impossible to avoid social realities when talking about the documentary. Whether it's the lack of a social security net for Chen Nianxi's parents, the quiet deaths of workers in a gas explosion in Old Well's mine, and of course, the suicides of Xu and other young workers at Foxconn, these issues all point to the serious social realities that workers in China must face - an open wound that cannot be treated without looking at it directly.

"After going deeper with their writing, they begin to observe their environment and the fate of other people in the same plight, and then try to shoulder the responsibility of calling for equality and dignity," Qin noted. "When all these voices converge, society has to listen to them. I hope more people can hear them, reflect, and then push for gradual changes in society."

Part of human history

Though the documentary focuses on the situation of Chinese workers, Qin explained that it reflects the problems that have arisen with the concept of "Made in China" and commercial globalization.

"For example, Xu Lizhi was a worker for an Apple OEM."

In the documentary, several poems reflect workers' participation in this wave of globalization. In one poem a colorbrusher for shoes writes: "Brush, brush, brush, brush / The shoes China makes walk seven continents."

"They are at the bottom of commercial globalization. They work to earn income and have made huge sacrifices and contributions to the rapid rise of the 'Made in China' concept," Qin pointed out. "But their situation is truly concerning."

Co-directed by Qin and Wu Feiyue, the documentary debuted at the 18th Shanghai International Film Festival where it won the best documentary prize. Last month, it was nominated for two prizes at the Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan and also made it on the shortlist for the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam.

In spite of these achievements the film hasn't seen a wide release in theaters in China.

At present, Qin is looking for ways to promote the film to a wider audience through both crowdfunding and working with organizations. Currently the film has been shown on 100 screens in both China and abroad and continues to build an audience.

The end of the documentary sees the birth of Black Bird's son. While this can be seen as a sign of hope, for Qin, who calls himself a "pessimistic optimist," it also indicates the continuation of the current cycle.

"Still, I hope that there may be a change."
Newspaper headline: Revealing the unknown